you learn a lot about the human race once you become a cashier somewhere

I used to work at Blick, and the biggest bags we had were about 48" long and designed to comfortably fit the large, 32"-long boards. They didn’t have handles, they were just big sheaths to cover large paper and boards.

Blick also sells drafting tables. I had a guy buying a large fancy drafting table for his daughter’s college dorm room (which had a furnished desk, but it wasn’t “nice” enough for her, and she wasn’t studying art or architecture—they just wanted to switch out her desk).

The desk was packaged up in a very large, very heavy box. I had brought it out on a dolly, which I said I’d use to wheel it out to his car for him. He refused and said to “just put it in a bag.” I said it wasn’t going to fit in a bag and was very hard to carry. He insisted: “I’m good, I can carry it myself. Just give me a bag.” I showed him our large bags and demonstrated that they wouldn’t fit over the entire box—and also, they didn’t have handles, so you’d have to just lift the box up in a bear grip anyway.

He said, “Well, you’re supposed to be an artist, right? You could just attach two bags together to make one bigger bag and then cut some handles in it. Easy.”

I tried explaining that the plastic would just rip, there wasn’t any good way to get the desk in a bag, it’s easy enough to just wheel the box out on the dolly it’s currently sitting on. I offered to give him several of our big bags anyway, if he wanted them, perhaps to line the inside of his car to protect it from the box if he was worried about something scratching or rubbing or any shmutz on the box.

He angrily told me to just give him the bags and a stapler and he’d do it himself. I just fuckin figured… why not? So I let him take the dolly and the box over to the side. He did eventually construct a frankenbag! He made a big ol’ frankenbag with two ripped-hole handles and laboriously got the giant box to fit inside.

Then he tried picking it up and it ripped apart along the staples. So he ripped the frankenbag off and just left it lying on the floor near the register. Then he got angrier and huffed and puffed and carried it out in his arms, having to stop every few steps to set it down and readjust his grip over the sides. It had also been raining and the sidewalk was very wet, so his box was also getting wet each time he set it down.

I just fuckin let him do it, he clearly did not want my help, and he was a manly man’s man who knew what he wanted…